And the NY Times and other Obama supporters are not happy, so the Times reveals the scoop that a large Republican SuperPAC donor is considering — yes, considering — an ad campaign in the fall focusing on Wright:

A group of high-profile Republican strategists is working with a conservative billionaire on a proposal to mount one of the most provocative campaigns of the “super PAC” era and attack President Obama in ways that Republicans have so far shied away from.

Timed to upend the Democratic National Convention in September, the plan would “do exactly what John McCain would not let us do,” the strategists wrote.

The plan, which is awaiting approval, calls for running commercials linking Mr. Obama to incendiary comments by his former spiritual adviser, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., whose race-related sermons made him a highly charged figure in the 2008 campaign….

The $10 million plan, one of several being studied by Mr. Ricketts, includes preparations for how to respond to the charges of race-baiting it envisions if it highlights Mr. Obama’s former ties to Mr. Wright, who espouses what is known as “black liberation theology.”

But the high-ish ground under the GOP collapsed abruptly with a New York Times story that details a race-baiting television campaign under consideration by a super PAC and some GOP strategists. The apparent goal: to stoop even lower than the race-baiting attacks that failed to torpedo Obama in 2008. The proposed ad, titled “The Defeat of Barack Hussein Obama,” would seek to remind voters of Obama’s incendiary former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. That relationship was litigated in the last campaign, though the president’s harshest critics may not have been satisfied.

The proposed ad is a black eye for the GOP even if it never hits the airwaves….

With unemployment hovering above 8 percent, a continuing foreclosure crisis and a trillion-dollar deficit, the Republican party doesn’t need to go fishing for ad fodder in dark places.

Sorry, he’s on the table and in the room, and all the false accusations of race-baiting which infect the media and left-blogosphere today — even if they work in preemptively squelching the ad campaign — will not stop people from thinking of the elephant in the room.

1. Wright somehow reconciled Christian doctrine for Obama to not clash with his Muslim up-bringing

***********************

That was interesting, wasn’t it? Obama apparently wasn’t sure if he was Muslim or Christian, and Wright reportedly still isn’t sure himself how/if Obama resolved that issue.

Remember the “my Muslim faith” slip Obama made during that interview with George Stephanopolous, and how the MSM brushed it off and accused anybody who questioned Obama’s commitment to Christianity as being an Islamophobe and spreading lies about Obama?

Oh the things we might have learned about Obama back in 2008, if only the MSM had been willing to look . . . .

“I repudiate the effort by that PAC to promote an ad strategy of the nature they’ve described. I would like to see this campaign focus on the economy, on getting people back to work, on seeing rising incomes and growing prosperity — particularly for those in the middle class of America. And I think what we’ve seen so far from the Obama campaign is a campaign of character assassination. I hope that isn’t the course of this campaign. So in regards to that PAC, I repudiate what they’re thinking about … It’s interesting that we’re talking about some Republican PAC that wants to go after the president [on Wright]; I hope people also are looking at what he’s doing, and saying ‘why is he running an attack campaign? Why isn’t he talking about his record?'”

They ought to Tweet about a mythical “Rev Wright” commercial every time an new “shiny object” appears that doesn’t deal with the economy.

When I went to my Yahoo mail account, this is the title for the lead news story:

“Again? SuperPAC plans to attack Obama on Rev. Jeremiah Wright.”

Excuse me … what do you mean “again?” … like this has been completely exhausted?

The MSM was dragged kicking and screaming to the story and then quickly put it to rest with Obama’s deflecting, dodging race speech, aka the greatest speech in history which should be taught in our schools.

Instead of “Again?” may I suggest the headline start with “Finally!! It’s about time!!”

I’d love to have that candid conversation about race. Let’s start with Wright, go one to how Elizabeth Warren got to Harvard with a degree from a lower tier school while Clarence Thomas is a certified moron and then finish up with the numerous incidents of black on white hate crimes that never get reported as such.

For more than 20 years the One sits in the pews listening to Wright’s perversion of the Gospel message. For his part the One says he never heard Wright say anything like what is captured on countless audio recordings of Wright.

And somehow, in the boneheaded thinking of McCain and now Romney, that is NOT relevant.

Please, Lord, don’t deliver to us another Mc_Dole. Give us a candidate that has some balls to confront the sickness of PC. And George Islam-is-a-religion-of-peace Bush wasn’t that guy.

If more of our political leadership understood this, we would not be in several of the situations we are currently in (both militarily and politically). Overwhelming force, without the tiniest shred of mercy, until the enemy unconditionally surrenders.

Seems to me the GOP would look better if they portrayed Wright in a more sympathetic light, focusing on the tapes the Klein has made available. Using the $150K bribe Obama authorized to keep Wright from speaking and the “honesty problem” (Obama told Wright his problem was that he [Wright] had to be honest — Wright replied that that was a good problem to have). Those two points alone are incredibly powerful, and say a lot about Obama’s character (or lack thereof). IMHO …

There might be more value just to keep the “discussion” of whether an ad will run in the public awareness. I think the GOP would get much more mileage out of a continual rumor that the DNC can’t really push back against. Once you run an ad, they’ll have an answer – but rumors….. now that would make them dance with ghosts. It’s more cost effective too.

1. The objective is to win the election, not to do a cathartic exposé of Obama’s character.

2. Our main point should be Obama’s Presidential record, especially on the economy. The Left always lets us know what they fear. Look at all the distractions they are serving up. (In fact, they are already accusing us of racism just for considering the Wright issue as a contingency. That should not go unmocked.)

3. The degree to which our campaign goes negative should be subordinated to our message on Obama’s record. Above all, we should not help the Left distract swing voters from that record.

The foregoing assumes that nothing incendiary comes out which was not public knowledge in 2008.

4. IMHO McCain did not lose because he refused to go negative. He did not lose because of Palin. He lost because, when the financial crisis broke, he showed he is too unstable to be allowed by The Button.

5. Of course we should counterattack the Left and make them pay. Of course we should refute their falsehoods. That doesn’t mean we should get drawn into their style of conflict.

They want to play victim. They want to cry Foul! while playing dirty. Don’t let them. Mock them instead. Puncture their sanctimony with mockery, and keep bringing up Obama’s record.

I agree. One reason my appreciation of Mitt Romney’s candidacy during the primaries grew was his continual focus on the main issues. Hopefully, he will continue to do so. For his supporters, it’s a prime posture as well. Focus. Focus. Focus.

As Prof. Jacobson notes, this started out with an Axelrod tweet this morning and has been picked up by the hard left super-PACS and the MSM (but I repeat myself). To wit, Axelrod demanded that Romney disown attacks on Rev. Wright.

Now I ordinarily wouldn’t want the GOP candidate dancing to the tune of the Democratic campaign manager.

But in this case it’s fine. The American people already KNOW about Rev. Wright; they just need to be reminded here and there. That’s what a super-PAC is really good at. In the meantime Romney can say that his hands are clean, that of course he ‘repudiates’ such attacks, and oh by the way did you know that there’s no coordination whatsoever between a campaign and a super-PAC, such that the latter can do whatever they want to do?

Heh.

To the end, if I were Mitt Romney I’d ask super-PACs not to mention Rev. Wright. I’d ask daily. I’d also ask at frequent intervals for super-PACs not to mention Tony Rezko, Solyndra, General Motors, Jon Corzine, Obamacare, and the Stimulus.

Romney: Mr. Axelrod of the Obama campaign demanded that I disown attacks on Rev. Wright. I wholeheartedly repudiate them.

However, this is being suggested by a Super-PAC. I seem to remember that Mr. Axelrod was quite forceful in his defense of the donation by Bill Maher to Priorities USA and that Mr. Axelrod stressed that it would be illegal of him or President Obama to become involved in the group’s decisions as a member of the campaign.

Perhaps you should ask Mr. Axelrod if he would like to clarify his position?

A major left media outlet found it a high priority to print 5000 word piece about a couple of incidents that occurred 50 years ago regarding Mr. Romney.

That was followed by left pundits opining that it was not only relevant, but indicative of Mr. Romney’s character today.

But we are being told now that the adult Mr. Obama’s 20 year attendance at his church, and very close family relationship with Rev. Wright…a demonstrated bigot and teacher of anti-Americanism…is somehow not indicative of anything at all.

A couple of my uber liberal friends admitted after the 2008 election they feared the Rezko story more than the rest. I thought was an interesting admission. I absolutely know for a fact the Palin convention speech set them over the edge. I watched them all scurry into attack mode immediately afterward. They do definitely telegraph their fears.

Our side is so irremediably pathetic. I don’t know whether to cry or laugh. The problem is, and always has been, that we don’t fight to win, we fight to win office.

Or, rather, we play not to lose. It’s all the GOP knows. But when fighting the Left, you have to match their viciousness with your own ruthlessness. Without hesitation or apology. Winning is next to meaningless otherwise. You end up with another George Bush term, and another Obama down the road.

Orwell said that to fight for something important you will need to get dirty. The GOP will never understand this. It’s why we need to keep retiring them.

You may not use your quarterback as a nose-tackle, but occasionally you use them as BAIT, to lure the other side into making a tactical error so you can move the ball through their defenses.

Those who do it the best appear to still have the ball and are drawing the opponent’s attention while the ball is actually on the far side of the field and moving toward the goal-line.

You don’t want to use your general as a rifleman, but occasionally he has to be out on the front lines leading the charge with a banner to show that he has the fire to WIN, lest the front line heavy fighters start to think “he doesn’t care, why should I?” (which was largely McCain’s problem: no one believed he would fight for Conservative interests).

And it’s not so much about running or not running this ad. It’s about a mindset. The idea that the GOP can be scared off the matter entirely is the point (and that’s what is happening); that it cannot find a way to integrate a reasoned critique of Obama’s long history of troubling, anti-social and even seditious connections into its campaign — that it preemptively rejects the possibility under Leftist threat — is the point. And a too sad and familiar one.

The right ties its own R and L shoelaces together before these hardball political races. Long ago the left, esp. the Democrat Party rule out the Marquess of Queensberry rulebook. To the GOP, do what’s necessary to win; the stakes are that high.

So far the Romney campaign has been spot on. Mitt has been very disciplined and it’s working. He’s stayed one step ahead of Obama and refused to take the bait when the media tries to distract him. He flipped the War on Women attack right back on Obama. Very sharp people working over there.

Let the new media carry the water. Mitt is going to take this campaign all the way to the presidency.

That’s an interesting story, and it prompted an interesting comment from a reader on Ace’s site. The person said that Alan Keyes, when he was challenging Obama for the Senate seat in Illinois, brought up Obama’s birthplace in their debates, and Obama responded that it was a non-issue, because he was running for U.S. Senate, not U.S. President.

I never saw the Keyes/Obama debates, but I’m curious to know if that account is true or not. If it’s true, it almost sounds like an admission from Obama.

Romney is feigning highmindedness but he’s operating on fear. Just like Obama is campaigning on another kind fear. This is the story of 2012 and of our time — the fearfulness and unfitness of our political class. It can be demoralizing.

I completely lost interest in Romney as a person or a leader a long time ago. Certainly it’s important to get rid of Obama, but that’s barely the beginning of the challenge. The hope is that the new media and citizen-activist movement will completely overshadow — and pressure and shame — a president Romney to do things he never envisioned doing. That is, to follow us.

“The proposed ad is a black eye for the GOP even if it never hits the airwaves….”

Once again the GOP rolls over and plays dead when it looks like they may actually fight on level ground. For months the Left has sniped and snotted on Romney’s faith but at the mere suggestion of highlighting the big disaster in Obama’s lifethe Left huffs and puffs indignantly and the Right wimps out.

The GOP apparently doesn’t want to win enough to criticize the Dems as much as they criticize Palin.

Just noticed all the comments indicating that it’s not Romney’s role be out front. Unfortunately the only being out front he is doing is repudiateing the ads before they even run. He should have deferred to the SuperPac. Why can Obama skate on the Bill Maher crap and all the vile stuff his supporters do but Romney is expected to run around tsk, tsking his supporters? Makes him look like a wuss.

Um, no. The article specifically says that this is not evidence that 0bama was born in Kenya. Which is correct. Authors’ blurbs are pure marketing, and not a reliable source for facts. They will put whatever sells, and feel no obligation to tell the truth. In this case the agency decided that being born in an exotic location and having a father who was a finance minister would help sell books, so that’s what they wrote. It’s as simple as that.

What this does show, and the point of the Breitbart article, is that 0bama is a manufactured character, a “composite character”, Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man. He is whatever it pays to be, and when that changes so does he.

Romney did it because his opponents in the primary were much weaker than he was. Obama is well funded and has the media on his side. You don’t try to outslug that.

Again, Romney’s team is very shrewd right now and has put Obama on the defensive. The Democrats are forced to try to use wedge issues to carry the day. That only gets you so many votes. Sooner or later, they will have to deal with the economy and they are very weak there.

1. Reagan played tough, he played hardnosed, and he played to win, but he didn’t play vicious. His opponents played vicious. Reagan prevailed—by landslides.

2. Hopefully conservatives see the need to get rid of Obama. If not, I don’t know what to say.

The real audience for the campaign should be the 10% or so of independent voters who will decide the election. I simply do not believe that nastiness is the way to get them on our side.

3. My current reservations about overly negative campaigning are purely pragmatic. Our opponents have been doing it for four years, and the public is getting fed up. When we offer a contrast to Democrats, we win; otherwise, we usually lose. I am especially skeptical when we resort to ad hominem campaigning out of unreflective passion.

The Left’s attacks should be countered, but we should never forget our game plan, our agenda.

4. That’s why I advocate, as a baseline, a positive, constructive mindset. Mockery will usually work better than nastiness. The public is being told we are bigoted kooks; let them look and see happy warriors instead.

Indeed. “Reagan played tough.” And, it wasn’t in a vitriolic way. Remember the Reagan/Carter debate when Carter was going through his litany and Reagan interjected, “There he goes again!” Reagan could be tough, without coming across as a brute.

Similar to Reagan, I think Romney can and will be tough as he needs to be, while not resorting to disagreeable and undesirable nastiness.

It’s obvious that the certificate of birth the campaign offered was a forgery. It didn’t take much to see that. So now we have another piece of evidence that says he was from Kenya. Why would they lie back then? They had no idea that he would become president.

The birth certificate that 0bama finally released, after more than a year of stonewalling, appears on its face to be genuine, and I know of no grounds for challenging it. As for why his agent would write that he was born in Kenya, that’s simple: for the same reason she wrote that his father was a finance minister — because it sounds better, and is more likely to interest publishers in buying his book. That’s all.

1. Fyi, John McCain in 2008 did not tell conservatives what to say and not say. Mitt Romney will not tell us what to say and not say. Your mistake is understandable given the Left’s tendency toward collectivist authoritarianism.

2. And your straw-grasping is understandable given Barack Obama’s lack of a record to run on: I should say, given Obama’s efforts to distract from the record he has to run on.

3. Conservatives will decide how best to inform our fellow Americans of what we offer, and of what Obama has failed to accomplish. We will continue to exercise our God-given liberty in discussing all alternatives, no matter how unlikely. Such an approach is called due diligence. It may disorient subscribers to a PC authoritarian ideology. If you don’t like it, tough.

4. You won’t have to rouse your unfortunately mistaken base with innuendo and inflated rumor for much longer. When we conservatives address our fellow Americans—at times and places, and by means of our choosing—, you will be in absolutely no doubt.

5. We conservatives celebrate diversity, especially the most important kind, diversity of opinion. Nevertheless, I think few of us will object that I close with these two words:

Nicely played, guys. Leak a story to the NY Times about a plan to spend $10 million to expose the connection between Jeremiah Wright and Barack Obama. Then sit back and watch the liberal media go ballistic as they scramble to defend Obama. Next announce that you have reconsidered as you marvel at the gullibility of the main stream media dupes.

So after playing vicious offense against other Republicans, Romney’s going to hold back and play soft defense against Obama and the Dems?

Obama’s surrogates will play the race card, the Mormon card, the gender card, the wealth card and every other card they can find, but establishment Republicans will take the “high road” — until it’s too late.